Four Big Trends to Watch at CES 2018

　　On the hot list for the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show are artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things (again), autonomous cars, AR/VR and health & fitness devices. No surprises. In fact, this looks a lot like the last year’s list.

　　But the factors that distinguish CES 2018 from last year are the pervasiveness of AI, connectivity and software platforms.

　　A broader theme for CES 2018 is how all these technologies, once they get connected, will alter consumers’ perception of reality.

　　Physical world starts to blur with augmented reality

　　Gregory Roberts, head of Accenture’s North American high-tech industry practice, talks about a “blended physical and digital experience.” The integration of some connected products is blurring the separate worlds — physical and augmented — where consumers live, he told us.

　　Data collected by IoT devices and information processed by AI engines can be more easily shared among different devices on the same platform.

　　Gone are the days when tech reporters argued over the merits of each “hot” consumer device — which brand is better — among smartphones, digital voice assistants, VR/AR headsets, 4K/8K UHDTV, fitness bands, etcetera, ad nauseam.

　　Instead, CES 2018 will challenge our ability to identify, discern and judge the intended — or unintended — consequences of connected AI-enabled devices built on a software platform such as Amazon’s Alexa.

　　Roberts likened the broader adoption and deeper integration of AI as akin to the advent of the Internet. “For many people, first, the Internet was a place to look up a few interesting things. Then, the Internet became so pervasive that it’s been deeply integrated in everyone’s life.” AI is about to hit that inflection point, according to Roberts.

　　Information such as what time you woke up today, how much sleep you had last night, where you need to go today, what’s your heart rate (as if that matters) and how many steps (who cares?) you walked today can be all uploaded, shared and turned into analytics. Your connected devices authorized to share that information can send actionable advice — “suggested amount of exercise you still need to do today” — to your smartphone. Worse, a hen-pecking message suddenly pops up on your TV while you’re recovering from all those steps in the privacy of your living room.

　　Good for managing your wellness, I suppose, but I find this scenario unnerving. Who asked you to track so much data about me?  Am I living with my mother again?

　　Okay, maybe this is just me. A lot of my friends like exercise apps that include a virtual coach, cheering them on and boosting their efforts with generic reinforcement messages.

　　On the other hand, there’s the issue how much private information gets sent to the clouds by connected IoT devices, and whether or how that data gets shared with other databases. That should make everyone nervous.

　　Blockchain comes to rescue IoT

　　Let’s face it. Privacy and security are the Achilles heel of IoT. There will be always a gulf between what consumers want and what the IoT business community sees as a way to make a buck.

　　Will CES 2018 offer any silver bullet to fill this deep divide? Accenture’s Roberts, calling blockchain “the hottest new technology on the horizon,” is betting on the promise of “un-hackable” methods that blockchain will bring to IoT, smartphones and transportation systems.

　　CES 2018 will be the first time for blockchain to generate notable interest at the event, he predicted.

　　At its core, blockchain is built on the idea of a distributed database. By using distributed digital ledger technology, blockchain, in principle, allows data-sharing “in a manner that is transparent, safe, auditable and resistant to outages,” Roberts explained.

　　In the IoT world, blockchain should be particularly effective. It installs a decentralized network of databases by eliminating the centralized database. Roberts noted, “Blockchain gives us the ability to share only specific parts of data with specific people.”

　　Of course, he concedes that blockchain is no panacea. First, there “needs to be a standard” for distributed databases. Second, many players in the ecosystem need to collaborate to create real value in the blockchain. But Roberts is hopeful, noting that the convergence of standards for databases will eventually enable many businesses to adopt blockchain. In a highly mobile society in which sensitive data will be shared, higher security is critical.

　　Blockchain will help.

　　Adding depth and ‘touchless’ to sensing

　　Stories about consumer electronics’ evolution have always revolved around user interfaces.  Headlines from CES over the years often came from the emergence of new user interfaces — such as motion (Nintendo Wii), touch (Apple iPhone) and voice (Amazon’s Alexa).

　　Apple iPhone X — rolled out later this year – has already coined the buzzword — “touchless” — for the new UI. Touchless is fast becoming the default UI for consumer devices.

　　In particular, traditional 2D imaging is adding depth as its third dimension.  In a recent interview with EE Times, Alexander Everke, CEO of Ams, called 3D sensing “one of the mega-trends of our industry that will drive the market over the next 10 years.” Naturally, Ams is a key component suppliers for a complex “TrueDepth” module that Apple devised for its iPhone X.

　　Everke believes that the depth trend in sensing is becoming pervasive. In smartphones, industry 4.0, automotive and emerging medical applications, the imaging world is rapidly transitioning from 2D to 3D information, he said.

　　The key to enabling depth is Time of Flight (ToF) sensors. A ToF sensor can be based on various technologies such as infrared, optical or ultrasonic. It allows users to interact with smart devices “without actually touching screens, or to interact with devices that don’t have a screen,” Michelle Kiang, CEO of Chirp Microsystems, told us earlier this year when she discussed a single-chip ultrasonic ToF sensor her company has developed.

　　Traditional motion sensors such as gyros and accelerometers are integrated inside a mobile device to track and measure the motion of each mobile device. In contrast, 3D sensing — or “natural motion” — can render the device “aware of [its] environment,” said Kiang. “It knows what’s happening around the device in a room.” A good example might be a digital voice assistant (DVA) in a room. The DVA, installed with 3D sensing, can sense your presence in the room and then turn itself on to listen for whatever you have to say.

　　AI platform battle

　　As physical and digital worlds blend, the key to tying them together is a software/AI platform. The effectiveness of the blended experience will hinge on the platform.

　　Accenture’s Roberts told us, “We’ve already seen software companies like Apple and Microsoft getting into the hardware business so that they can create devices tightly coupled with their software platforms. Similarly, hardware companies — smartphones, wearable fitness monitors, DVAs and TVs — are all busy embedding a lot more software and AI capabilities inside their devices so that they can create their own integrated world.”

　　Then, there are AI platform companies like Amazon and Google. “At the show, anticipate more software platform companies entering more hardware markets over a range of devices such as servers, digital assistants, tablets, smartphones, drones, and autonomous cars,” said Roberts.

　　Can any of these players create a common platform allowing anyone to develop a blended experience? Everyone agrees that it is the latest Holy Grail, and yet, at issue is the control over the platform. The industry is still at the very beginning of that hardware/AI platform conflict. The battleground will be Las Vegas, in January.